still broke; sometimes knitting

Day: June 18, 2009

There hasn’t been much knitting going on around here, to which the slow growth of the as-yet-unknown shawl forelornly bears witness. I still love the yarn and the little squirrel bag it all fits into so nicely, though.

The good news: on Monday I finished one paper, weighing in at a monster 35 pages (that’s including my ridiculously extensive endnotes). The bad news: I still have another one to finish, currently holding on at a feather-weight 8 pages. And today I would just rather not.

1. Respond and rework: answer the questions on your blog, replace one question that you dislike with a question of your invention, add one more question of your own.

2. Tag eight other people.

What is your current obsession?

Edmund Crispin. An example, “Padmore uttered a single disclamatory vocable which would no doubt have blossomed into a full-length previous engagement if the Rector had given it the least chance.” Another, “[…] and the Botticelli, Fen saw at once, was an almost supernaturally talentless picture […].” (Both from Glimpses of the Moon)

If you could go anywhere in the world for the next hour, where would you go?

Only an hour? Hmm … I think I would go sit in my favorite café in Konstanz, the Café Adler, with a good friend. Maybe take a walk by the lake. And then eat some ice cream.

Which language do you want to learn?

Well, I would love to be really and truly native-speaker fluent in German. I get by, but that’s not the same. Or French. I’ve been stuck at the intermediate level for years and have developed a strangely Germanic accent. Finnish or Swedish would be awesome, too. Because they’re practical, obviously.

What do you love most about where you currently live?

Friends.

What is your favorite colour?

I like bright colors. Just about any of them, as long as they’ve got some saturation.

What is your favorite piece of clothing in your own wardrobe?

I get excited when I get to wear my pink underpants. Does that count?

What were you doing ten years ago?

June 1999: just finished my first year of college. I was at home, probably not doing much of anything. Being from a depressed mill town has the (dis)advantage of limited summer employment opportunities.

Describe your personal style?

I’m with Blue Garter on this one: definitely Northwest Casual. Even though I don’t live in the Northwest anymore. I’ll admit it: nothing feels so much like home as wearing socks and Birkenstocks. It’s my favorite guilty pleasure.

If you had $300 now, what would you spend it on?

Some really hard-to-find British Golden Age detective fiction.

What are you going to do after this?

Work. I’m going to try and beef up those eight pages.

What are your favorite films?

Don’t laugh: Mannequin and Grosse Pointe Blank. I am not high brow.

What inspires you?

Color! In the academic world, I seem to be drawn to topics/areas/authors that are largely ignored or forgotten.

Your favourite books?

It depends. I love so many Golden Age detective fiction authors: Edmund Crispin, John Dickson Carr, Agatha Christie, Ngaio Marsh, Margery Allingham, Patricia Wentworth, Josephine Tey … and, and, and. I also really love a book I first read in middle school and recently rediscovered on my shelf at home: Hey World, Here I Am! by Jean Little. My academic life is mostly taken up with books I have to read, am supposed to read, or should be reading, but I do admire Elfriede Jelink and Ingeborg Bachmann; Rahel Varnhagen’s letters made me cry.

Do you collect anything?

I used to collect paper clips in high school. I have a big chain of them in a drawer somewhere. And yes, I was a big dork. Now, being a sophisticated grad student, I collect Golden Age British detective fiction with hideous paperback cover art.

What makes you follow a blog?

Hmmm … personality, I think. I like to get a sense of the person writing.

Do you like to comment on blogs or just lurk?

It depends. Usually, it takes an initial comment here before I feel comfortable taking the risk.

What’s one thing you dream of doing?

I’ve always wanted to teach English in Germany. I think secretly I want to be a German Hausfrau when I grow up.

What’s your favorite gulity-pleasure summer movie?

I love big, explosive, utterly craptastic thrillers/blockbusters/nonsensical trash. Nothing more fun than driving into the Hamilton AMC 24 multiplex on a summer evening for a couple hours of absolute cinematic garbage. Definitely one of my favorite Princeton memories.

I’m not going to tag anyone, but feel free to play along if you’d like!